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Artist or Maker: Lorser Feitelson 1898-1978
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Medium: Acrylic in colors, on canvas,
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Dimensions: I. 60 x 60 in. (152.4 x 152.4 cm)
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Provenance: Louis Stern Fine Arts, West Hollywood
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Notes:
Line is the most important and expressive component of Feitelson’s work.
From his earliest kinetic studies in the late teens to the schematic line
drawings and arrows included in his figurative paintings of the 1930’s to the
ribbon paintings here, the liveliness of his work is a result of the disposition
of lines and the sense of movement they convey. The emphasis on line is
traced to his interest in the Renaissance. Inherited from antiquity, the linear
quality of Renaissance art, as art historian Heinrich Wölfflin argued in the
early twentieth century, significantly distinguishes it from the Baroque’s
painterly style. As Philip Guston, one of Feitelson’s students in the early
thirties, often recalled, Feitelson introduced him to Peiro and Uccello,
important sources for his own work. Whether reflecting Piero’s serenity
or Uccello’s muscular force, both artists use line for expressive purpose.
Although Guston’s mature style is more painterly than his mentor’s, Feitelson
retained the Renaissance-inspired smooth, clean edges where shape meets
shape throughout his career (Frances Colpitt, Lorser Feitelson – the late
paintings, Louis Stern Fine Arts, Los Angeles, 2009, p. 8).
